Prof. Dr.-Ing. Astrid Ley

Prof. Dr.-Ing. Astrid Ley

Since 2014
Chair of International Urbanism, Co-Director of the Städtebau-Institut (Institute for Urban Planning and Design) and course director of the MSc Integrated Urbanism and Sustainable Design (IUSD)

2014
Urban development research analyst at the German Advisory Council on Global Change (WBGU)

2011 – 2014
Post-Doc researcher in a DFG funded research project on “Housing for the Urban Poor: From Local Action to Global Networks” at Habitat Unit, TU Berlin

2009
Ph.D. (Dr.-Ing. in Architecture), Technische Universität Berlin, Dissertation on “Housing as Governance. Interfaces between Local Government and Civil Society Organisations in Cape Town, South Africa”

Since 2004
Urban development consultant and trainer to bilateral and international development agencies (oikos human settlements research group)

2003 – 2013
Teaching and research staff member at Habitat Unit, TU Berlin

CV Summary

Astrid Ley is a professor for International Urbanism, co-director of the Institute for Urban Planning and Design (Städtebau-Institut) and course director of the international MSc program Integrated Urbanism and Sustainable Design (IUSD) at University of Stuttgart. She also works as an urban development consultant and trainer to bilateral and international development agencies (oikos human settlements research group). She holds a degree in architecture and urban design from RWTH Aachen and a PhD from TU Berlin. Her professional life started as a project coordinator at the “Bundesweite Servicestelle Lokale Agenda 21”, Agenda-Transfer, in Bonn before joining Habitat Unit, TU Berlin, as a teaching and research staff member and lecturer for urban design and urban management. She held a DAAD lectureship position at the School of Architecture and Planning, University of the Witwatersrand in Johannesburg, South Africa, in 2010 which led to a permanent status of a visiting senior lecturer and researcher at Wits. Prior to her position in Stuttgart she was urban development research analyst at the German Advisory Council on Global Change (WBGU) and senior urban researcher in a DFG funded research project on “Housing for the Urban Poor: From Local Action to Global Networks” at Habitat Unit, TU Berlin.

Her expertise and publication record include topics related to the urbanisation in the Global South, informality, housing and upgrading processes, the role of local governance, community-led processes, participation and co-production in urban development. Since 2013 she is co-editor of the series “HABITAT-INTERNATIONAL – Schriften zur internationalen Stadtentwicklung” at LIT Verlag.

Ley, A. (2012): Juggling with Formality and Informality in Housing: Some Lessons from the New South Africa, in: Berking, S., McFarlane, C. and Waibel, M. (eds.): Urban Informalities: Reflections on the Formal and Informal. Farnham and Burlington: Ashgate, p. 13-28.